Editor’s Note: J.C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE:JCP), Cisco Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSCO), Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), Sothebys (NYSE:BID)
Activist Loeb Takes $156M Stake In Sotheby’s (Law360)
Shaking off his recent brush-off from Sony Corp., activist investor Daniel Loeb disclosed a large stake in Sothebys (NYSE:BID)’s on Monday, but remained coy about his plans for the auction house. Loeb’s hedge fund Third Point LLC is now one of Sotheby’s biggest stockholders with a 5.7 percent stake valued at $156 million, according to a regulatory filing. It joins two other funds, Nelson Peltz’s Trian Fund Management LP and Marcato Capital Management LLC, run by former Bill Ackman protege Mick McGuire.
Is Raj Rajaratnam really living like a prison king? (CNBC.com)
Two years ago Raj Rajaratnam received the longest-sentence ever handed down for violating insider trading laws. Suddenly, people are worried that he’s been treated too kindly—all because of the complaint of an unnamed source in the same prison. The impetus for the renewed attention on Rajaratnam was a column in Tuesday’s New York Post by John Crudele reporting that Rajaratnam, the former hedge fund manager convicted of insider trading in 2011, is “kickin’ it big in the Big House—with a personal ‘manservant’ at his beck and call.” “He’s reigning like a king,” a prison insider tells Crudele.
Madoff Feeder Fund Settles For $98M (FINalternatives)
Another Bernard Madoff feeder fund has settled with the court-appointed trustee seeking to recover money for the arch-fraudster’s victims. Maxam Capital Management’s Absolute Return Fund will pay $97.8 million into Irving Picard’s restitution fund, according to a court filing yesterday. The deal will allow it to file a claim for nearly $276.7 million from the Madoff estate. A federal judge must still approve the deal, which resolves a three-year-old lawsuit and would add to “eventual distribution to defrauded Madoff customers with allowed claims.”
Apple takes hedge fund top spot: Citi (CNBC.com)
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) stocks were U.S. hedge funds’ top holding during the second quarter this year, beating travel website Priceline and iPhone manufacturer Qualcomm to the winning spot, according to new research from Citi. Eleven out of 50 hedge funds held Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) among their top-10 stocks, as hedge funds bolstered their IT holdings overall. Meanwhile, Twenty-First Century Fox was the biggest gainer in Citi’s quarterly top-10 stocks review, featuring in eight hedge funds’ top-10 lists.
After Ackman’s Exit, J.C. Penney Remains a Hedge Fund Play (New York Times)
William A. Ackman may have severed all ties to J.C. Penney Company, Inc. (NYSE:JCP) on Monday, after selling off his 18 percent stake at an estimated $473 million loss. But his rivals in the hedge fund world aren’t bailing out of the troubled retailer just yet. A review of Penney’s publicly disclosed investors shows that many big investment firms are still betting that the company will manage to pull itself out of its woes, with more than a dozen ranking among the retailer’s 100 biggest shareholders. They include Soros Fund Management, which most recently reported a 9.1 percent stake; Perry Capital, with a 7.3 percent stake; and Glenview Capital Management, with a 3.8 percent stake.
